


Nicklas Backstrom Is Only One Human Man And Shouldn't Be Expected To Deal With All This

by whitchbhitch



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Kid Fic, M/M, Single Parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2019-11-17
Packaged: 2021-01-28 22:18:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21399544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whitchbhitch/pseuds/whitchbhitch
Summary: “Ten more minutes at the park!” Nicke called. “Then we’re going straight home! No ice cream this time, I mean it!”“’Kay!” called his beloved children, his legacy, the two people he would move heaven and Earth for, as they tried to trip each other going up the stairs to the slide.In which Nicke is a beleaguered single dad, Alex is a hot Russian tutor, and the Backstrom children are little rascals.
Relationships: Nicklas Backstrom/Alexander Ovechkin
Comments: 11
Kudos: 167
Collections: ALL CAPS Exchange 2019





	Nicklas Backstrom Is Only One Human Man And Shouldn't Be Expected To Deal With All This

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eafay70](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eafay70/gifts).

> I felt sort of weird including Nicke's real life children, even though they're aged up and it's an AU, but at the same time, I also felt very weird like... pretending he didn't have any and making up some pretend children for him, so let's just say that these are two COMPLETELY UNRELATED children of ALTERNATE UNIVERSE Nicklas Backstrom whom he also just happened to name Haley and Vince.
> 
> Teen rating is mostly for language and some mild mentions of sex.
> 
> eafay70 I ADORE kidfic so I was so excited when I saw that you liked it!! I hope you enjoy!!!

It was difficult to have a conversation with your daughter when she was hanging upside-down on the monkey bars, but Nicke was doing his best.

“You said it was important to be multilingual. You said we would have a leg up on the other kids in school because we know more than one language. Wouldn’t knowing a third give me even _more_ of a leg up?” Haley’s face, rapidly reddening as it filled with blood, was stubborn. She reminded Nicke so much of himself in that moment, he almost wanted to laugh.

“And how long have we been holding this secret desire to learn Russian?” he asked. “As long as the desire to learn karate? Or horseback riding? Or parkour?” Each of those desires, once Haley was actually signed up for classes, only lasted about two months.

“This time is gonna be different dad, I promise. I really wanna learn.”

“You really think ‘it’s gonna be different’ is going to convince me? After all those times ‘it was gonna be different’?”

Haley scowled. “No, I didn’t, which is why I have my contingency plan.”

“Oh really? What’s that?”

“I’m gonna hang upside-down here until you let me learn Russian! Or I’ll pass out, brain myself, and then you’re gonna feel bad because I brained myself, so you’ll let me learn Russian anyway.”

“I see,” said Nicke, fighting a smile. “Foolproof.”

“Exactly,” said Haley, and then burst into laughter as, at the edge of Nicke’s vision, Vince tripped and fully faceplanted into the playground wood chips. Before Nicke could even react, Vince yelped out an “I’m okay!” and popped back up to continue racing wildly towards the slide.

Nicke sighed and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. Every age with the two of them was a journey, but Haley at twelve and Vince at ten was really testing his patience.

“Look, we’ll see,” he said. Haley beamed. She knew from experience that a “we’ll see” just meant a delayed yes.

“Thank you, daddy!” she said, as she did some sort of terrifying flip to drop down off the monkey bars. She gave him a big hug.

“I mean it,” said Nicke, as he rested a gentle hand on her hair. “We’ll see. It might be a no.”

“Yuh-huh,” said Haley, and bolted off, probably to tease Vince.

“Ten more minutes at the park!” he called. “Then we’re going straight home! No ice cream this time, I mean it!”

“’Kay!” called his beloved children, his legacy, the two people he would move heaven and Earth for, as they tried to trip each other going up the stairs to the slide.

Once they got home, Vince still licking chocolate ice cream from his fingers, Nicke opened up his laptop and googled “Russian kid’s tutor”. But he wasn’t going to tell Haley until at least tomorrow. He had that much pride.

///

Nicke didn’t have a… thing about people coming over to the house. He didn’t. It was just. Well, the thing was. He was Swedish. There was something deep in his bones that desired a clean, perfect, minimalist house with perhaps a few tasteful accent pillows.

Instead, what he had, was a house that was, let’s say… comfortably lived in. Kids needed a lot of stuff. They needed clothes, and books, and toys, and shoes, and homework binders, and all of those things had to go somewhere. Haley and Vince were actually pretty good about cleaning up after themselves, but they were kids, and they didn’t clean everything perfectly. And Nicke was only one man, who had a full-time job and was a single dad besides.

So, when someone came over to their house, it was possible that Nicke went a touch… insane.

“Vince, come clean up your markers!” Nicke called. He was staring up at the ceiling fan, considering whether or not it was worth it to dust it.

“You told me to do my action figures!” Vince yelled, plaintive, from across the house.

“Okay, do the action figures and then get the markers! Haley!” Haley looked up at him in surprise as he clasped her by the shoulders as she walked by. “You need to make sure you’re woking hard, okay, baby? And make sure you’re polite when the tutor comes. He’s being very kind coming over to our house.”

“Yeah, dad, I get it. Try your best, don’t bring shame to the Backstrom family name.” She grinned up at him.

“Exactly,” he said, and kissed her on the top of the head.

The doorbell rang.

“Oh, god,” he said. He wasn’t ready. He hadn’t even made a decision about the ceiling fan.

“It’ll be okay, dad,” said Haley. “I’m sure he’s seen messier houses then ours.”

Nicke took a deep breath in. And out. And went to open the door.

Standing on his door was a man with a face like a craggy mountain, if that mountain was handsome. His hair was shot through with gray. He was huge, and broad, and Nicke wanted to climb him like a tree which was _not_ an appropriate thought to have in this situation. He hadn’t sounded this hot when they talked over the phone.

The man met Nicke’s eyes and smiled, and then glanced behind him, to where Haley was hovering, suddenly shy.

“You must be Haley,” said the man, in lightly accented English. “I’m Alex, it’s nice to meet you.”

Haley came forward and took his offered hand, shook it. She looked up at Nicke, obviously unsure of what to do now.

“Why don’t you go get settled at the kitchen table?” suggested Nicke. “Alex and I will follow you in just a second.”

She nodded, clearly happy to have some direction, and turned around to head towards the kitchen.

“Hi, I’m Nicke,” said Nicke, holding out his hand. “Don’t worry about Haley, she’s very quick to warm up to people.”

“Oh, no worries,” said Alex. They shook hands, and Nicke had to keep himself from gulping at how strong Alex’s hands were. It was _so_ not appropriate to be having these thoughts about his child’s Russian tutor. He had to get it the fuck together.

He settled Alex with Haley at the kitchen table, and with a kiss to the top of Haley’s head, left them there. He sat himself down in the living room with a book, just in case they needed him at all. For a while, all he could hear was quiet murmuring, and after a bit, Haley laughing every once in a while. That made Nicke smile. He was glad she was enjoying herself, it meant she might stick with this for longer than a few months.

Eventually something caught his ear. Was that… singing? He got up and decided to just take a peek into the kitchen. There was Alex, sitting next to Haley, pointing to letters together as they sang what was obviously the Russian version of the ABCs. It made Nicke remember teaching Haley her ABCs, back when she was small enough to be carried in one arm, and Nicke was so terrified of fucking up in made his heart hurt. He backed away from the door, leaving them to it, a smile on his face.

///

Haley’s Russian tutoring continued for a month, then two, then four, then six, much to Nicke’s delight and horror. Delight, because Haley had obviously found something that she really loved. Horror, because it meant that, twice a week, Nicke had to deal with Alex in his house, being all handsome and nice and good with his children. It was torture.

Haley absolutely adored Alex. She loved learning from him, and before long started working on Russian outside of her tutoring homework, just to impress him. She would learn songs by ear, sing them over and over until she got the words, and then sing them to Alex. He would applaud, and then sit her down with the lyrics and help her translate them. During her (carefully scheduled and supervised) internet time, she started watching Russian cartoons and children’s shows. Once, in the car, she asked to DJ, and set Nicke’s phone to playing some terrible Russian techno.

“Alex showed it to me!” she explained, shouting over all the horrific noises that were emanating out of Nicke’s car speakers. Nicke looked to Vince for some support, but he was just bouncing along to the beat in his car seat. After that, Nicke put limits on how many of “Alex’s songs” they could play in a row. The limit was one.

Winter started to set in, and Alex started to wear these enormous, very soft looking sweaters that Nicke couldn’t help but want to bury himself in. He would occasionally get wiffs of Alex’s cologne after he left, something that smelled like wood smoke. The sixth time he found himself sniffing after the scent, trying to catch traces of Alex even after he’d left the house, he shook his head at himself. Enough was enough. He couldn’t keep harboring this crush on his daughter’s Russian tutor. It wasn’t appropriate.

That resolution lasted right about until the start of the next session.

The snow was hitting hard that year, even in DC. It had already been snowing all day, and when Nicke opened up the door, Alex had somehow managed to get snow on his eyelashes. His _eyelashes_. Nicke was only one human man. He couldn’t be expected to put up with this.

The snow continued to fall, heavier and heavier as Alex and Haley worked. By the time the tutoring hour was over, it was a full-on blizzard. The snow was piling up, and, Nicke noted as he checked his phone, they were having troubles getting enough plows out. He figured it would take a damn long time for them to get out to his little suburb.

Alex joined him staring at the window. “Aw, damn,” he said. “Looks bad out there. Not looking forward to driving in that.”

Nicke raised an eyebrow. “Don’t be ridiculous. The plows haven’t even gotten out yet. It’s supposed to die down in an hour or two. Stay here, at least until the roads are plowed.”

Alex raised an eyebrow right back. “Sure. As long as you don’t mind.”

“Of course not,” said Nicke, cursing himself internally. He was fucked. He was so, so fucked.

“Dad! Dad, dad, dad, dad, dad, daddy!” Haley and Vince ran into the living room, practically on top of one another. Vince caught a toe in the doorway and face planted down into the carpet, but popped right back up again, the prospect of snow too exciting to dampen his spirits.

“Dad, look it’s snowing!”

“Dad, can we go out and play?”

“Daddy, it’s not even dark out yet!”

“Dad, can we please?”

“Dad, you gotta let us go out!”

“Daaaaaaaaaddyyyyyyy!”

“Okay, okay, okay,” said Nicke, holding up his hands against the bombardment. “Yes, you can go out and play for an hour or so.” Over their cheers, as they turned and raced away, he called, “Haley, make sure Vince doesn’t take his gloves off, he’ll get frostbite in his fingers! And Vince, watch the—! …And he’s fallen.”

From down the hallway: “I’m okay!”

“That kid falls down more than any child I know,” Alex said. Nicke started. He’d practically forgotten Alex had been there, he had been so buried under the child onslaught.

“Yeah, thank god he has a skull of steel. And bones made out of rubber. He always just gets back up again.” Nicke looked at Alex out of the corner of his eye. What the fuck was he going to do with Alex for at least an hour? He could think of plenty of options, but certainly none that were appropriate. “Do you want tea?” Tea was good. Tea was appropriate. Tea would give him something to do with his hands that wasn’t stroking them over Alex’s chest to see if his sweater was as soft as it looked.

“Tea sounds great,” said Alex, and followed Nicke into the kitchen.

As Nicke started the kettle, he searched for an appropriate topic of conversation.

“Did you grow up in Russia? How did you end up coming here?” he asks.

“Yes, I did. My mother was a basketball player for the women’s national team, and after she retired, was a coach. I would follow her around to different teams and international competitions. I was exposed to a lot more foreigners than your average child. You know, Americans, Japanese, Germans, all those international teams that my mom would play. I could have stayed in Russia, but I wanted to see more of the world, so when it was time I went to college in the states. Plus, once I realized I was gay, I sort of had to get out of there. You know.”

Nicke tried hard not to react to Alex’s admission that he was gay. He just couldn’t think about it too hard, because if he did, he would die.

“You have a bit of an accent, though, where do you come from?” Alex asked.

“Well, my story is actually pretty similar to yours. Well, except Sweden is pretty okay with me being gay.” Nicke swallowed around nothing and tried to look out of the corner of his eye to see how Alex reacted. Nothing. The man had a very good poker face. “My dad was a professional hockey player, got drafted into the NHL in 1980. We traveled around a lot too, to different American teams, and then back to Sweden, and then back to the US. My dad eventually settled to coach in Sweden, but by that point I had been born in America and I had spent more time in the US. Sweden didn’t feel like home. I came back to the US for college, and I stayed. But Swedish is my first language, so I’ve always spoke with a bit of an accent.”

“Haley mentioned that you all speak Swedish.”

Nicke nodded as he poured out the water into mugs. “Yeah, I made sure to, so that when we travel back to Sweden they can feel at ease. I don’t want them to feel disconnected from my family.”

When Nicke turned around to hand Alex his tea, Alex was standing a lot closer to him that he had been before. In fact, so close that he almost bumped in to him.

“Nicke,” said Alex, and Nicke shivered when he said his name. “Can I ask you for some advice?”

“Sure.”

“I have this kid who I tutor. Super sweet, super smart. And her dad is super hot.”

Nicke swallowed. “Sounds like a conundrum.”

“Mm-hmm. I’ve been into him for a while, and I thought that he might be into me, too, but I couldn’t ever really tell.” Alex took the mugs and set them on down, then took another step towards Nicke, making him back up until he hit the counter.

“But now,” Alex continued. “Now I’m pretty sure he’s into me, too. And I’m not sure what I should do about it.”

There was a moment of frozen time, where they were standing so close to each other Nicke could feel Alex’s breath on his face, before he said, “Well, I’d say shoot your shot.”

Alex huffed out a laugh, and then. Then he leaned in, cautiously, giving Nicke enough time to pull away. But Nicke didn’t, and so, like magnets, like it was inevitable, their lips met. Alex’s lips were warm, and plush, and when he sighed into Nicke’s mouth, Nicke could feel himself melt. Alex wrapped an arm around Nicke’s waist, and Nicke rested his hands on Alex’s chest. His sweater was, indeed, very soft. But that’s not really what Nicke was focused on at the moment.

They only pulled apart because, from just outside the window, they heard a sharp yelp and a soft thump. And then, inevitably…

“I’m okay!”

**Author's Note:**

> Is this fic extremely similar to a fic series I wrote for Star Wars in 2016? Yes! Did I not realize this until I had already finished writing it? Of course! Am I apparently just a slut for single parents finding the love that they deserve? OBVIOUSLY!!!


End file.
